Monday, November 11, 2013

NY Times Exec Editor Jill Abramson Schooled on JFK History

It was delightful to read the New York Times Book Section yesterday to see Executive Editor Jill Abramson schooled by none other than Prof. John K. Galbraith on history to do with JFK's intention to pull all personnel out of Vietnam. Whether Abramson is another asset deployed by the CIA, is open to debate. But according to CIA document 1035-960 - in one highlighted paragraph- a primary objective is:

"To employ propaganda assets to [negate] and refute the attacks of the critics.Book reviews and feature articles are particularly appropriate for this purpose".

Is Ms. Abramson a dupe (like former NY Times reporter Philip Shenon) or a dope? We can't be sure but she did write in her Oct. 27 book review piece:

"The belief that he (Kennedy) would have limited the American presence in Vietnam is rooted as much in the romance of 'what might have been' as in the documented record.'

"The record shows that on Oct. 2 and 5, 1963, John F. Kennedy issued a formal decision to withdraw American forces from Vietnam. I documented this 10 years ago in Boston Review and Salon, and in 2007 in the New York Times Review of Books. The relevant documents include records of the Secretary of Defense conference in Honolulu in May, 1963; tapes and transcripts of the decision meetings in the White House; and a memorandum from Gen. Maxwell Taylor to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Oct. 4, 1963, which states:All planning will be directed toward preparing RVN forces for the withdrawal of all U.S. Special Assistance units and personnel by the end of calendar year 1965.'

If Abramson is writing in the putative premier newspaper in the U.S. why couldn't she get the documents before spouting abject nonsense? Hell, she didn't even have to dig them up herself, merely research a bit (her own newspaper's archives) and get hold of Prof. Galbraith's NY Times Book Section piece from 2007. Is she that incompetent? Or is she a part of an ongoing "Operation Mockingbird" operation - the residue of the CIA's stamp on dozens of American newspapers dating from the 1960s? To see a Youtube video on 'Mockingbird', with open admissions, go to:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDCfTIapds0

Also, see: Kathryn Olmstead: Challenging the Secret Government: The Post-Watergate Investigations of the CIA and FBI, Univ. of North Carolina Press,.

David Talbot, in his Salon.com article The New York Times is Still Lying to Us, observes:

"We’ll never know, we’ll never know, we’ll never know. That’s the mocking-bird media refrain this season as we commemorate the 50th anniversary of America’s greatest mystery – the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. New York Times executive editor Jill Abramson hijacked a large chunk of her paper’s Sunday Book Review to ponder the Kennedy mystery. And after deliberating for page after page on the subject, she could only conclude that there was some “kind of void” at the center of the Kennedy story. "Actually, there's no "void" at all other than to working CIA assets, ignorant dopes or disinformationist pawns whose intent is to keep Americans from exploring a critical juncture in their history - when the national security and war state likely assumed control of the nation, turning all future presidents into complicit puppets. For more on this get hold of Peter Dale Scott's book, The War Conspiracy: JFK, 9/11 and the Deep Politics of War. which discloses the parallels between Kennedy's murder and 9/11. (Note: this book is not for mental lightweights!)Also see this video featuring Prof. Scott:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WgarbaC8NwOn this Veterans Day, the most significant action an American citizen can take is to learn about our history, our real history - our hidden history, not the bunkum on offer from most of the media. By doing so we also can ensure no future unnecessary loss of lives arising from security state and warmongers' manipulations. Until we do the heavy mental lifting and exercise our wills, apart from being infantile "consumers", we will remain hostage to the military industrial complex and see more and more lives lost on account of foolish military adventures- entered into without sufficient serious forethought.
We ought to also be wary of hyper-military propaganda - such as the soldiers are "protecting our freedoms". NO, they are not! Nothing they are doing whether in the Afghanstan theater or Iraq, is "protecting" my freedom. As Justin Doolitle puts it in today's salon.com: ('Stop thanking the troops for me: No, they don’t “protect our freedoms!”)

The combination of unanimous, entirely uncritical appreciation for the military, and the irrational belief that we owe gratitude to the troops for virtually everything we cherish in life, up to and including freedom itself, is very dangerous for our intellectual culture. It stifles any potential for rational, coherent discussion on these matters. It makes us, free citizens of a constitutional society, meek and excessively obeisant.

Doolittle adds that: The corollary to the claim that our freedom exists only at the pleasure of the military, of course, is that the same military can revoke said freedom if it so desires.

Irrespective of our political afffiliation, that's something we all ought to bear in mind - before we next sacrifice our critical thinking to the absurd mantra that the "troops are protecting our freedoms".

About Me

Specialized in space physics and solar physics, developed first astronomy curriculum for Caribbean secondary schools, has written thirteen books - the most recent:Fundamentals of Solar Physics. Also: Modern Physics: Notes, Problems and Solutions;:'Beyond Atheism, Beyond God', Astronomy & Astrophysics: Notes, Problems and Solutions', 'Physics Notes for Advanced Level&#39, Mathematical Excursions in Brane Space, Selected Analyses in Solar Flare Plasma Dynamics; and 'A History of Caribbean Secondary School Astronomy'. It details the background to my development and implementation of the first ever astronomy curriculum for secondary schools in the Caribbean.